Back into the Arena

“ At my signal, unleash Hell.”

Maximus Decimus Meridius

From: Gladiator – 2000

There must be something going wrong with space and time. It’s 2012 but it seems 1994. Only Mr B’s face is alarmingly different. His assault troops are ready, his TVs are working at full speed for his campaign the same way they did that time. New shows talks about the dreadful economic crisis (that was just a fantasy while He was the PM) and in the News He’s interviewed so that He could tell us the “real truth” about Him (“they cuddled me in Bruxelles” he said when at the EPP meeting everyone tried to avoid him like a plague asking SuperMario to run for Italian PM) and even if every new statement seems to contradict the previous one (the same way he caused SuperMario resignation now asks him to be the Candidate for His Party) the interviewer pretends not to notice (He doesn’t pay people to contradict him). Yesterday, a masterpiece: a 80 minutes (80!!!) interview made by a popular TV host and actress particularly loved by housewives and older people (journalists had already done their bit) during a popular Sunday show to launch His campaign (though the general election campaign ain’t already started officially) mixing the usual slogans (“I’ll cut taxes) and humanity (so that the voter is touched and vote for him). At last, Mr B could tell the Nation that He’s just a poor victim of those horrible Magistrate working in Milan, that politics is a dirty thing he does for us only (not to protect his business), that he throw those “elegant dinners” because He divorced, His mother died and His sister too, His children are always around the world and He felt alone in those big mansions, and now he apologizes to His voters if He followed some bad advice and those bad magistrates in Milan (always them) took advantage of this situation. But now He’s happy, He’s not alone any more, He has a fiancée who’s beautiful “outside and inside” (!?!?!?) and is aged 28 (she passed the age of consent)… Some political analyst says that this time things have changed, TV is becoming an obsolete medium and it won’t be easy for Mr B to win despite awful polls (the left is about 20% ahead) and we simply hope that ignoring him he could fade away (politically speaking) like the bogeyman. Unfortunately, in the meanwhile, his troops are ready to unleash Hell.